Getting the ball down

[Six11 Hitting]

Her PC says she needs to get on the mound and face live batting and realize there is a penalty for high balls and then she will try harder to get the ball down.
First I would say that if your DD is pitching 4 days a week she isn't leaving the ball high in the zone due to lack of effort. This seems crazy to me.

Second I would guess without seeing her throw that she is leaning back at release. I have seen in the past that leaning back will cause the ball to go high. She needs to be slightly forward at release.

 

[doublesteal]

try looking at her legs. My one pitcher was struggling with the same issue, after watching her release a million times and just happen to notice her weight was over shifted on her back legs .. I told her and she said she did it caus she thought it would help the ball drop, she corrected it and the impact was immediate.

 

[fballchgup]

Didn't notice if you mentioned if she is throwing a peel drop or turnover drop.

 

[drc9805]

I've seen it mentioned in this thread to take a shorter stride and get on top of the ball. Is this how most of you would teach the peel drop or can it be thrown with your normal stride and just release earlier than your fastball with the same 12-6 spin?

 

[Ade's Dad]

I've seen it mentioned in this thread to take a shorter stride and get on top of the ball. Is this how most of you would teach the peel drop or can it be thrown with your normal stride and just release earlier than your fastball with the same 12-6 spin?

Some teach a shorter stride with the rollover drop.

 

[knightsb]

I've seen it mentioned in this thread to take a shorter stride and get on top of the ball. Is this how most of you would teach the peel drop or can it be thrown with your normal stride and just release earlier than your fastball with the same 12-6 spin?

DD throws her peel drop with her normal stride. She tries to release earlier to impart a flat trajectory. We have taken a sharpie and colored a black stripe across the four seams in the center of the ball to judge spin direction. Her spin is closer to 1-7 spin. I have heard it explained before the reason some suggest planting the stride foot quicker is this acts a a cue to release sooner.... We prefer to try and keep as many of her mechanics the same as possible for each pitch.

 

[marriard]

It could be much more simple than everyone is making out.

If the ball is dropping like the pitch is supposed to and mechanics are good but is just ending higher than you like then it may be as simple as aiming lower.

I find a lot of pitchers always want to 'aim' or target the catchers glove . If they are providing a target that doesn't help the particular pitch then this can be an issue. Learning to pick their own target to focus on rather than relying on the catchers target and then adjust this based on how the pitchers are going can help a lot. We do a lot of location drills where there is no target - just an instruction of where we want the pitch to be located.

(That said - my DD throws the rollover/drop curve. If she doesn't finish her follow through low and turned into her thigh the ball goes high every time).

 

[knightsb]

Here is a video of my DD doing some walkthru warm-ups throwing her peel drop. If you pause the video between 20-23 seconds and look closely at the ball, you can see the 1-7 black sharpie line.

[video=youtube_share;ckeytbuaIpI]http://youtu.be/ckeytbuaIpI[/video]

 

[Goobie]

If she has been working as hard as you say and she has picked up speed, my bet is simply the release point. Extra speed probably means a faster arm circle and she is probably just holding on a little too long. As the earlier poster mentioned, trying to aim lower should help with the release point. Personally I would try that before adjusting the stride or lean of the pitcher.

Ask her to show you where she "thinks" her release point is. While it probably isn't exactly where it truly is in a slo-mo video, wherever she says is OK. Then tell her to try to release it a little earlier. (for example if she says she releases at the front of her drive leg have her try to release at the back of the drive leg... regardless of whether that is truly where she releases the ball, getting her mind to tell her release a little earlier should help)